Settle in for a by-no-means comprehensive list of some of the most popular stories in our pages this year.
Religion
Their beautiful dark twisted fantasy.
At a meeting of Texas social conservatives, all anyone wanted to talk about (and eat) was Chick-fil-A
No matter how incendiary his latest tweet or policy might seem, Donald Trump can count on evangelical preacher and Fox News fixture Robert Jeffress to defend him. What’s behind the Dallas pastor’s unconditional embrace?
Sabika Sheikh, a Muslim exchange student from Pakistan with dreams of changing the world, struck up an unlikely friendship with an evangelical Christian girl. The two became inseparable—until the day a fellow student opened fire.
The 23-page report outlines details of 56 priests dating back to 1940.
The McAllen nun fights fiercely for the dignity of immigrants.
The wildly popular Houston author and speaker is staring down the ”sin” and ”ungodliness” in her own denomination.
I've struggled to keep my grandma and aunt with me since their deaths. But this year, I decided to honor their memories—and show them my life as an adult—by making my first día de los muertos altar.
A day before Jeff Sessions and Sarah Huckabee Sanders used the Bible to justify separating immigrant families, a resolution from the Southern Baptist Convention in Dallas had already contradicted them.
"The procedures to protect women have to be institutionalized and standardized. If your model for authority and leadership is that whatever the pastor in charge says goes, then you don’t have accountability."
A decade after the largest custody battle in U.S. history, some of those involved speak about their memories.
Branch Davidians Clive Doyle and Sheila Martin lost almost everything in the Waco fire, but not their faith.
A quarter century after 82 Branch Davidians and 4 federal officers died outside Waco, retired FBI agent Byron Sage still can't stop thinking—and arguing—about what happened.
The founder of Cristo Rey Jesuit College Prep in Houston's last gift to his students—and to all of us—was his wisdom.
After the Sutherland Springs shooting, church leaders in Texas grapple with safety and encouragement.
Details continue to emerge about the shooting in Sutherland Springs. Here's what we know so far.
In 1980, two nerds in Dallas started their own religion. Forty years later, SubGenius founder Ivan Stang and filmmaker Sandy K. Boone reveal the true story of the long con.
The federal government argued that an undocumented minor did not have the right to abortion while in federal custody.
San Angelo makes its case for María de Jesús de Ágreda to the Vatican.
Moving electricity through West Texas comes at a steep price.
The Texas evangelical leader landed herself in hot water over comments about the LGBTQ community. But the blowback prompted a bigger discussion: What does it mean to be an evangelical today?
Joel Osteen's megachurch is finally opening its doors, but only after a social media storm.
The pontiff did not weigh in on if Dez caught the ball during the 2015 playoff game against the Green Bay Packers (but come on, it was a catch).
What are “sincerely held religious beliefs?” Nobody really knows.
An Austin church remakes Catholicism without the Pope, celibate priests, or most of the other rules.
Paxton defends questioning Muslim prayer room on "Fox and Friends."
A pastor at a Corpus Christi church is on a mission to build “the largest cross in the Western Hemisphere.”
Evangelist Lester Roloff drew a line in the dirt to keep the State of Texas from regulating his Rebekah Home for Girls. Years later, then-govenor George W. Bush handed Roloff's disciples a long-sought victory. But this Alamo had no heroes—only victims.
The country’s largest group of Muslims live in Texas, yet many of them don’t feel welcome here. A few young and progressive leaders—like Irving imam Omar Suleiman—are working to change that.
The Freedom From Religion Foundation demands their removal citing the First Amendment, but do the signs really make non-believers feel unwelcome?
Brann becomes a casualty in his own war with the Baptists. Texas Collection of Baylor University “In the year of our Lord, 1891, I became pregnant with an idea. Being at the time chief editorial writer on the Houston Post, I felt dreadfully mortified, as…
How a computer-loving Texas Tech grad launched one of the fastest-growing megachurches in the country.
That’s one way to do outreach to voters who may feel alienated by the presumptive Republican nominee for President.
The festival apologized, but the issue isn’t just racial insensitivity.
The display was to promote the separation of church and state, but it seems the governor missed that point.
His comments about Syrian refugees have gotten him national attention and could push more Texans to follow his lead.
According to the governor, local mayors aren’t allowed to ban firearms in their city halls, and religious charities can only help people he approves of.
I always knew that the work my dad did as an Episcopal priest and grief counselor was important. But I didn’t understand how important until the birth of my son.
What Ahmed Mohamed's case tells us about the American dream.
The deep fryer defender’s social media profile has since deleted the threatening image.
A Pew Research Study of religion in all fifty states suggests that the shift toward a less religious America may not just be on the coasts.
A Garland community center held a contest offering a $10,000 prize for the best drawing of the Islamic prophet Muhammad, and it ended with two dead and a third injured.
We’re not even a quarter of the way through 2015 yet, and mosques have been burned, loyalty oaths have been demanded, and—in Dallas last week—a Muslim man was shot in the back while watching the snow fall.
The veteran rapper won’t perform his music at Rice for any amount of money. School is for teaching.
Catholics who see the racy film may have to get on their knees afterward.
At least seven places of worhsip in Texas have indoor running tracks, and other key takeaways.